414. ANIMAL REPRODUCTIONS. 
ed gn a general plan in calling the different fa- 
milies of organized beings into exiftence, or on 
plans that may comprehend all the individuals 
of each family. How many millions of feeds, © 
how many millions of eggs produce nothing, yet 
every egg and every feed includes a minute or- 
ganic whole, which never unfolds, though def- 
tined for evolution. The philofopher will not 
haftily conclude, that the exiftence of thefe or- 
ganic wholes is ufelefs, becaufe it muft inftantly 
occur to him, that his knowledge is not fo great 
as to difcover all the ufe of beings, and becaufe he 
will eafily conceive, that what is not appropriated 
to its particular ufe in this world, may be fo in 
the next (1). 
Experiments on newts, {nails, earth worms, 
and the like, feem to indicate, that the original 
and primitive figure of germs is fpherical or el- 
liptical ; at leaft, this appears to refult from the 
figure in which the members are firft feen. In 
the beginning, they are very minute roundifh 
buds, which gradually affume another fhape that 
removes them farther and farther from their ori- 
ginal one. The wonderful metamorphofis of 
the chicken, before it attains its perfect ftate, 
may enable us to judge of thofe which the limbs 
of newts and other regenerating animals under- 
89% 
(1) Confult, Part 1, 2, 3) 495, of the Palingenefie. 
